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0 pointsethbr12y ago0 comments

Default to curious, active skepticism.

That means looking at methods, discussing confounding factors and how they were and weren't handled correctly, and what alternatives could have been employed.

There's a similar form of dismissive, passive skepticism that says: science has problems, so it's not even worth looking harder.

Note: I'm assuming good faith on part of parent, so not pointing fingers. But it is a thing I've seen on HN, especially re: biology.

Tl;dr - don't tl;dr science.

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frognumber2y ago

Good points.

I will comment though: Passive skepticism is important too. At this stage, the bigger problem is treating one study outcome as if it were fact. Dismissing established, well-replicated science is, of course, a problem as well, but at least from what I've seen, the much bigger problem is that you have one correlational study. Popular media runs with it. People make products based on it. The underlying science is nonsense.

The good news is that it's also possible to solve. There is constant progress in science, of course, but if we ignore all science from the past 20 years, we're still left with pretty good science (at least for the level of policy-making and personal decision-making). Simply ignoring anything recent solves the hype problem. And for all the anti-vaxxers and flat earthers, those are still minorities since recognizing established science is actually not especially hard.

ethbr1OP2y ago

> [...] but if we ignore all science from the past 20 years, we're still left with pretty good science

But what if the people of 20 years ago had made that same choice? And the people 20 years before then? Etc.

It's not a tenable long-term position.

> Popular media runs with it. People make products based on it. The underlying science is nonsense.

This has always been the case, though. A majority of people are dumb and/or lazy. Consequently, the quickest way to make a buck off them is the above.

But that trash science gets popularly communicated doesn't opine on the advancement of the academic practice.

> And for all the anti-vaxxers and flat earthers, those are still minorities since recognizing established science is actually not especially hard.

This feels like something we degree pretty strongly on.

(1) I don't think it should ever be easy to tell bad science, (2) I certainly don't think established science should hold an especially privileged place (heliocentrism!), & (3) I do think that the anti-vaxxers and flat earthers deserve a place in any true scientific practices (there's a myriad of ways they generally demonstrate their ineptitude, but ideas should not be verboten).

frognumber2y ago

It's a perfectly tenable long-term position. You're missing two points:

1) People aren't uniform. I read all the papers in my narrow field and evaluate them. On the other hand, in 99% of fields, you and I are a popular audience. We should rely on established science. And in my field, you should also not rely on hot-off-the-press because most of it is nonsense.

2) Science becomes established -- over decades -- when you have multiple corroborating results, replicated, with multiple methodologies. We know the earth isn't flat because we e.g. sent a man to the moon. That's a very different standard of knowledge than Viagra and Alzheimers. Before acting on this, let experts in this field do their thing for another decade and understand the pathways, do an RCT, etc. At that point, it will be 20-year-old fact. Or perhaps it will turn out to be a correlation / causation issue, and you'll never hear about it again. Either way.

TL;DR: It takes a long time to bake good science.

ethbr1OP2y ago

I'd say the method that science becomes established is one of the problems, because a big chunk (50%?) of that process is non-scientific (political people processses).

I'd feel a lot better if "established" meant something more like well-replicated (with an economic/academic model to support that).

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frognumber2y ago

Good points.

ethbr1OP2y ago

> [...] but if we ignore all science from the past 20 years, we're still left with pretty good science

But what if the people of 20 years ago had made that same choice? And the people 20 years before then? Etc.

It's not a tenable long-term position.

> Popular media runs with it. People make products based on it. The underlying science is nonsense.

This has always been the case, though. A majority of people are dumb and/or lazy. Consequently, the quickest way to make a buck off them is the above.

But that trash science gets popularly communicated doesn't opine on the advancement of the academic practice.

> And for all the anti-vaxxers and flat earthers, those are still minorities since recognizing established science is actually not especially hard.

This feels like something we degree pretty strongly on.

frognumber2y ago

It's a perfectly tenable long-term position. You're missing two points:

TL;DR: It takes a long time to bake good science.

ethbr1OP2y ago

I'd say the method that science becomes established is one of the problems, because a big chunk (50%?) of that process is non-scientific (political people processses).

I'd feel a lot better if "established" meant something more like well-replicated (with an economic/academic model to support that).

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse